if you lose yourself, i will find you
by windthorne
Summary: they have 6 lives to meet, to make it right. reckless love never dies. / reincarnation au, written for jeankasa secret santa 2014.


**a/n**: i made this story up long before the events of ch 60+.

i've been trying to write this for a year and i finally got it to work. pls love me.

also, there is so much symbolism in this fic and i really really hope you find at least one symbol in this story. i didn't even mean for this to happen, but repetition can sometimes be a beautiful thing.

this was written for askangeliquecandide for the 2014 jeankasa secret santa event.

enjoy :)

* * *

**_we were the broken and the mended_**

* * *

Somewhere in the midst of a forest with spacious trees and scarce life, a distant noise of shattered glass awakened an old man from his slumber.

The sound encouraged him to rise and inspect the ruckus, and he sluggishly trudged to the kitchen of his antiquated cabin, more disoriented than fearful of the noise that had woken him up.

The man swiftly grabbed a knife by his side with a look of aggravation dawning on his old-aged face. If it hadn't been past midnight, maybe he would have been more alert. But this was not the case.

A figure was kneeling down beside the broken window in his kitchen, and the man quickly raised his knife to defend himself, standing closely to the doorway.

"Who are you?" he asked with an unhurried tone, arms held high. He was much too experienced with crime to act rationally to events like this.

The figure stood up slowly, and he first noticed the long raven hair running down the back of this person. Pale skin was hidden under wraps and dirtied clothing, and the faint stench of blood drifted in and out of his senses.

The invader then calmly turned around, revealing the slightly wrinkled porcelain face that had been masked away from him just so.

And he realized what she was immediately.

The silk hair, the ebony eyes, and the wrapped wrist was only a testimony to his first thought.

_An oriental._

His eyes widened, and he couldn't help but lower his knife just a bit.

He sucked in a breath and examined her once again, before admitting his accusation.

"You are one of them."

The old woman didn't react the way he expected her to—only nodding sharply, eyes trained on his with coherent relevance.

"I did not think anybody lived here." She realized she had made a grave mistake.

The man felt rather surprised at her comment, even though his house did appear more abandoned than anything else.

"Well, I live here," he stated matter-of-factly, "and I ask what a person like you is doing here in the forest, in my cabin."

Her eyes were steely and bold despite all the years she had lived, almost like her words. "They're coming for me already. I just need a place to rest in… just a little bit longer."

"Why not just face death already?" his words were painfully vicious, "You have already seen too much."

"I do not… I cannot..." the woman held back her tears with clenched fists. "I cannot give up yet."

He didn't respond, wondering just how much this woman had gone through. Her eyes had bags that held the weight of a lost world, along with years of exhaustion and sleeplessness exposed on her face. It hurt just to look at her, and yet he couldn't help but feel in awe of all her strength, despite the cruelty.

She must have been beautiful. Somehow, someway.

"So, are you going to kill me? Or will you at least delay my death?" the tone of her voice hid the heart breaking pierce of a soul. "Will you help me?"

The man's arms were still above his head and it pained him when he slowly lowered them back down, throwing the knife onto the counter with ease. He was never one of those men—he couldn't do this to her, to anyone. There was a reason he's solitary in his living quarters.

The world was becoming too violent for his soul to cooperate.

"Come," he held a hand out to her, "Rest first. We can figure this out tomorrow."

The oriental took his hand with dignity, and his body grew warm inside, even with all the winter air spread thin.

She slept for the next three days, unable to get up because her body had become impossibly weak. Maybe her malnutrition and old age will hit her first before the men do.

He was told the stories of how her family had been spread out, how she had been running for years, how her race was dissolving from the inside out. And she couldn't do anything about it.

The old man wished he could help her. But how do you erase the memories of someone who had seen too much and received nothing in return?

His answer came when they finally arrived, two weeks into her stay. And their coming was anything but silent.

Torches lit up the obscurity outside his small cabin, and he shielded the woman away from the blazing flames just before he was ripped away from her, bulky men grabbing and throwing the both of them to opposite sides of the room.

He could never be one of these men. He could never.

"I heard news of a scummy oriental running around here," the largest of the men, probably the leader, clutched her face with a slimy grin, "It was only a matter of time before I found your frail little body."

"Please, do not harm her!" His voice did nothing to suppress the tears running down her face.

"Oh, we won't hurt her," the man's smirk was sinister and anything but caring, "We have other plans for her."

You only see orientals once, his mama used to say.

"No! Save me! Save me!" The woman shrieked as two men dragged her away, arms wrapped around her waist and eyes wiped of humanity.

He didn't move. He remained still, kneeling at the hands of the men, devoid of the ability to do anything,

But watch.

He might as well have been one of those men.

* * *

**_we were the doomed and the destined_**

* * *

"Come on, wake up please!" she roughly slapped him, splashing water on his face frantically. "_Please_, let me help you!"

The man that had been previously unconscious opened his eyes groggily, finally reviving from the fall out. The woman breathed a sigh of relief, unwinding her hands from his jaw. She backed away from his lying figure on the ground at the sight of his moving chest.

The man blinked a few times before sitting up, dazed. "Where… where am I?" he glanced down at his dirtied outfit, and jumped at the sight of crimson on his body. "What—_what the hell?_"

"Shush, calm down," the woman came back to kneel by his side, laying a cool hand on his shoulder. "Don't injure yourself even more."

"Injure myself?" The man looked at his bloodied abdomen, and cursed at the stabbing affliction in his gut. "What has happened to me?"

The woman appeared to be knowledgeable in medicine and caretaking, already urging the man to lie back down slowly. "You got hurt in the midst of the attack, and I managed to carry you back here."

"Where is here? What attack? Who the hell are you?" He continued to fight her attempts to help him, sitting up despite the unfathomable pain.

"Calm down!" she gave up on trying to aid him and bashed his head back on the damp floor. The man yelped and clutched his throbbing head.

"What the hell, woman?" he closed his eyes to urge the aching away from the blinding, invisible wound. "Get away from me!"

"No," she stood her ground. "I'm trying to help you. You've bled too much and you're acting delusional."

"I have a right to be!" the man tried to sit up again, but the woman held him down. "One moment I'm sitting in my shop, waiting tables like normal, and the next thing I know I'm lying down in the middle of rubble and my blood with some mysterious lady!"

The woman was more than irritated now. "Could you be any snarkier?"

"I have been told so."

"My lord. Just… calm down." She took a deep breath. "Just… first, tell me all you remember before this."

He frowned. "I just told you. I was just doing my daily routine, and I black out, and then I wake up here with you."

She stared at him with a melancholy undertone in her eyes. "Is that all you can remember?"

"Seems to be it." He huffed, and breathed languidly to lessen the burn in his stomach. "Care to tell me what happened in that timeframe?"

There was a lapse in their conversation, and the man examined the woman before him more closely. She seemed frightened… empty… distressed.

"Um… are you all right?" he asked softly.

The woman shook her head, face going as opaque as a ghost.

"These… things came to our village. Giant creatures." She gulped. "They were monsters. They attacked everything in sight, knocking down buildings and signs and… and eating people."

A pause. "What?"

"I… I had heard about a rumor that spoke of them," she had started shaking, and the man quickly reached for her hand, though it was just out of his range. "I thought it wasn't true. That these 'giants' were just a way to provoke the outsiders… but then I saw it. I saw them."

"I had heard about the giants, too," the man gave up on grasping her hand and focused at the ceiling, "I didn't think it would be true. I didn't even get to see them…"

"Good," she bit her lip, "you wouldn't want to see them."

He was more puzzled now. "What did they call them? Was it… titans?"

The woman nodded, breathing deeply to hold back her uneasiness. "Yes, titans. That was what they were." She blinked back tears. "They're real. They're horrifying. And they're here."

The man clutched his stomach, even though the pain seemed to be zilch compared to this announcement.

"Is that why I can't remember anything?"

"A giant smashed your shop and it slammed you against the wall of my apartment," she slid a strand of hair behind her ear, "I had to help you. You were about to be stomped on by one of those monsters…"

"You could have just left me there to die." The man grunted. "It would have been much better than lying here in pain with the knowledge of damn giants ravaging my town."

"Don't say that."

"What difference does it make that I'm here?"

"The difference is that neither of us are alone," she whispered. "At least for tonight."

This successfully suppressed him, and he waited for her to speak up again. But she didn't. They continued to sit in silence for the rest of their time together.

The woman left a few hours later to find more supplies for the two of them.

"Don't move at all," she jabbed a finger right above his injury, causing him to cringe. "Or else I will hurt you myself."

"Nice to know you care." He managed to blurt out just before she was out of his eyesight.

Damn feisty medic.

He smirked at the thought of this woman telling him what to do, but in the end he felt thankful for her efforts to keep him alive. It was an admirable gesture, and he promised himself that he would repay her for saving him when she arrived.

Except she never did. The man waited minutes, hours, days, until he was too powerless to move and he completely forgot why he was there in the first place.

Why did she never come back?

The man received his answer when he heard the deafening stomps approaching him, closer and closer and closer.

He never got to thank her for letting him live just a bit longer.

* * *

**_we were the reckless and the passionate_**

* * *

The boy noticed her stride down the walkway of the mess hall with endearing and subsequent fierceness, and for the first time in his life, he suddenly thought he was falling.

Falling into oblivion, and more.

The girl's beauty was striking and flawless, pulling him in without knowing why, and yet the feeling of obsidian and gold meeting was… slightly familiar.

Someone was striking a match somewhere; someone was igniting a flame.

_"Sorry… ah… you have beautiful black hair."_

And it _burned_.

Because the boy didn't choose for this to happen—for some twisted reason, he was drawn to her. For some reason, he felt a connection that may or may not be reciprocated, but he didn't care.

He heard the girl's name (literally) for the first time in his existence: Mikasa Ackerman.

And his twelve year old self fell head first into a devotion that could never be any more reckless than it already had been.

He proclaimed he would be the one to protect her, through thick and thin. Never mind that Eren existed, he would be the one to watch her when nobody else would.

But no matter how much the boy tried to fufill this, it would never be enough.

"Too much blood," she choked out a sob as they laid in the cart, hands so close yet so far, "It hurts to breathe."

"Don't give up!" he was screaming into her ears but it would never be enough, "We're almost back to the headquarters! We're almost there!"

Six years older and no longer heartless teenagers, carved inward and out, pulled this way and that,

And yet he still looked out for her.

Even when it was already too late.

"Stop it, Jean," why did the girl's voice do this to him? "I am just a liability. The survey corps will have to do without me."

"Don't say that," the boy clenched a fist, "You can't be serious. The Mikasa I know would never say that!"

"I just need to go back home," she muttered quietly, eyes closed to block out the light that resembled his pupils. "I just want my home again."

If Eren or Armin were here, they could have calmed her down. They could help the girl, give her hope.

But he was not either of them. The boy never would be.

Because _it would never be enough._

The blood completely soaked the fabric that had been used to cover the girl's injury. Taking down the titan she had been fighting was easy—but then another titan had messed with her 3DMG line and had caused her to lose balance, and the downfall began.

The boy swiftly went to replace the wrappings, but she stopped him with the grasp of his wrist.

"Take me home, Jean." Her words were a surprise to both of them. Despite her blurry vision and her loopy mind, she still had the energy to speak his name.

And this sudden realization caused a shift in the boy, slowly, swiftly, surely.

"Okay," his voice cracked but he continued nonetheless, "I will."

"Please," she begged for him, tightening her grip but falling just short of his fingers, "Let's go home."

He lost the chance to see her eyes one more time, eyelids incapable of opening. But the boy couldn't find it in himself to feel despair.

"Alright, Mikasa," his hand fell to her face, tracing the curve of her jaw and running his calloused fingers through her hair, "You lead the way."

The girl was unable to speak, replacing her words with nods and shakes, deliberate wrist squeezing and eyelash fluttering.

"I'll take you home," the boy whispered slowly, "And we'll meet again soon."

He didn't know what pushed him to say this, but he never felt any different for saying it.

It was never enough.

The girl worth a hundred soldiers was gone before the next sunrise.

* * *

_**we were the hopeless and the hopeful**_

* * *

She took one, two, three steps, leaned over his still body, and cleared her throat. "Wake up, 322. You can't sleep in here all day."

322 woke up to her booming voice with a shriek, scrambling up and away from her to the opposite side of the room in less than a second. She watched the rise and fall of his chest against his orange suit, fear ridden across his dull eyes.

The prison guard raised a brow as she crossed her arms, a little more intrigued than annoyed of his sudden act. He was obviously not used to a place like this.

"You don't seem so peppy."

The prisoner suddenly realized his stupidity and exhaustively ran his hand through his hair, walking back to his stiff bed where she was. "Why would I be happy in a place like this?"

She shrugged. "Not sure. There are some that obviously love this place, and some that absolutely loathe it," she shifted her stance, "You must be the latter."

The prisoner simply let out a snarl, unable to look her in the eyes.

She changed the subject when the silence began to cling to her like a phantom. "You've got work to do, 322." He glanced up at her with an impassive expression, but she ignored it. "Like I said—you don't get to be in here all the time."

The man reluctantly stood up and stumbled away from her without another word, thundering footsteps giving the reticent room some life once again. He approached the door before swiftly turning to her again.

"My name isn't 322." He announced with a sense of determination in his voice. It was blunt, intense, and clearly out of the ordinary for someone like him.

She refused to take her eyes off the man before her. "I don't care."

Except, for some reason, she did.

His name was Jean Kirschtein, and he murdered a family in cold blood on the 14th of August. He pleaded innocent for as long as he could, but all the facts added up against his wishes. He had been sentenced to death in a year's time.

But every time the prison guard observed this man, she got a hunch that something wasn't right.

He might have just been a person in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or maybe he got framed without realizing. Maybe all of this was a mistake.

Or maybe, this was all correct. And this man really was a monster.

But how was she able to believe all of these facts when she saw him day in and day out?

"I don't have the blood in me to kill," he admitted one day when the air was so delicate and the food was too stale for the both of them. "I can't… hurt people. I get this feeling all the time that there has been too much blood shed in this world. In the past. And now."

He kept his eyes trained onto the pasty white floor. "How can I kill an entire family when I don't even have the capability to do it?"

The prison guard examined the man, from his soft, uncalloused hands to his weak knees. Just like an ordinary person. Except the fact that he was a murderer.

But those hands—they couldn't be hands of a killer.

How could he be one?

"I don't know." Is all she answered to his question, replying what seemed like ages after his words were uttered.

They spoke when she stood by his cell, separated by bars and connected by the bitter air that threatened to dissipate their souls.

_"I have dreams of blood sometimes. But I've never seen blood in real life. How the hell does that work?"_

They spoke when she slid his food through the bars and their eyes held each other longer than normal.

_"I don't know why I have this job. Maybe I'm just so determined to keep the evil from ever seeing the outside world ever again."_

They spoke when he was about to sleep and she was about to switch shifts, heavy hearts and guilty demises abound.

_"322. I know you're innocent."_

_"… I am."_

But those words would never be able to deter him from his sentence. Nothing could stop the truth from aligning itself with the troubled times and the false notions that people made up to save themselves from one another.

"I'm sorry." She said to him when she realized there was nothing she could do to help him. All the prison guard saw was a man with too loud footsteps, warm hands, and a mind that wished for another way.

All she saw was a man who was not a killer.

"I'm sorry, too." He said to her when he knew he was doomed and life wouldn't give him another chance. Maybe in his next life he wouldn't be as shitty as he claimed to be.

He went to his death the next day.

And every day after that, the prison guard never forgot his number nor his name.

_322\. Jean Kirschtein._

If only there was another way.

* * *

**_we were the fire and the eyes_**

* * *

The woman had no idea what had caused all of this to commence. Everything was normal—the business workers were chattering into their mics with monotone voices, the janitors were occasionally passing by with the sound of rusted wheels rolling down the aisles, and the computers and the _tap-tap-tap_ of the keyboards were managing just fine.

And then the next thing she knew, the whole office was up in flames.

Something had malfunctioned and exploded, triggering a chain reaction of eruptions and outbursts of flares and heat. Minute by minute, the office grew hotter and hotter until she ended up curled in a corner, unable to move with all the debris of the fallen desks and tabletops. Papers were scattered everywhere, being swallowed up by the orange and yellow, and shelves were tossed this way and that.

She gathered herself together and started to make her way for the exit. The woman was a fighter and a stubborn one for sure, and she knew that she would get out of this mess no matter what. In order to save oxygen, she masked her face with her savior scarf and occasionally yelled for help every once in a while. She coughed up a storm but refused to back down, walking cautiously across the office while helping her coworkers out to safety.

The woman shoved people to the stairways before her, always going back to aid the others that were still trapped inside.

But her strength could only last so long, with the smoke in the air clogging her airways and effectively blinding her.

It wasn't until her legs started to give out that somebody came to help her instead.

As the office became more veiled in flames, it became unbearably harder to breathe. She took deeper breaths to conserve what little air there was left for her.

The woman gave up in her attempts to be careful and simply chose to run through the debris, shielding her eyes from the burning smoke.

This attempt proved ineffective, and she ended up smashing into another person instead.

"Oof! Dear god!" Definitely a male.

The woman suddenly stood up in a panic, noticing that it was indeed a firefighter, bulky gear and all. "Finally," she coughed painfully, wiping the soot from her face, "You guys arrived."

"Hey, have faith in us. We'll be there—" Suddenly, he stopped in his phrase. "Wait—are you?"

He lifted up his mask in that instant, revealing a long face and bright, amber eyes.

And the woman's heart dropped.

_But why?_

The firefighter, probably stunned and appalled that there was still someone here, immediately went to gather her in his arms. She didn't fight back.

"We got another one." He spoke into his radio, all while clutching the woman bridal style through the fire. "I think this was the one that was helping them escape."

Her coughs became more insistent and painful, and she buried her face into his uniform.

"Ma'am, stay with me here," he tightened his hold on her, "We're almost out of here."

She responded with a nod, wheezing every other breath.

The last thing she heard before passing out was the deepness of the man's breathing, warm air hitting her covered ears.

When the woman came to, just about half an hour later, she found herself in a cot just outside the burning building with an oxygen mask wrapped around her head.

"I see you pulled through," the same voice from earlier spoke again to her right, "I was just beginning to think you didn't make it."

She pulled out the gas mask and wiped her forehead with urgency, clearly embarrassed. "Oh god, that was intense," the woman pulled her hand away and still saw black soot coating the back of it, "But I think I helped more people than you did. _Have faith in us_, you say?"

The firefighter raised a brow, smothering a part of his blackened forehead further. "Hey now, pretty lady," he crossed his arms, "We came as soon as we can. And _you_ were the one that passed out on me. At least I was somewhat worried." He smirked. "Heck, I took my helmet off for you."

"What a stupid move that was."

He sat up closer to her, completely amused. "Oh?"

The woman gave him a small smile, looking away from his intense gaze. "Anyways…"

She reverted her eyes back to him. "Thank you. You saved my life."

He shrugged nonchalantly. "Been there, done that." He leaned towards her oh-so-slightly. "I think you owe me one."

"And why so?"

"Because you insulted my job performance and I saved you anyway." His smirk was still alive and bright.

She raised a brow. "Do you do this to everyone you save?"

"No," the man slowly shook his head. "Just you."

Something in his expression changed, and the woman suddenly remembered the moment in the fire, when their eyes glazed into one another.

Without an explanation as to why.

The fire continued to incinerate the office building, despite the efforts of the firefighters and the police. But neither seemed to notice.

But once again, the moment shattered, with the blaring of his radio and yet another police whirl arriving.

A chuckle. "Sorry about that," he shook his head and gathered himself together, "I've been acting funny today."

The woman sighed and leaned back against the cot, her head spinning. It had to be the aftermath of the fire that was making her feel so lightheaded. That was definitely it.

But before she could even utter another word, a simple 'thank you' again on the tip of her lips, the man had already began jogging back to the firetruck just a few feet away.

And yet, he stopped in his path and turned back to her.

"You know what? Have coffee with me!" The firefighter yelled loudly to the whole damn world, all while jogging away from her. "In the bistro right around the corner, next Monday! Drinks on me!"

She chuckled in her uncomfortable cot, blushing at her cooled fingertips. They didn't even know a thing about each other… and he wanted to have coffee?

They literally just met.

_We'll just have to see._

The woman didn't know whether or not he was joking or being serious, but unfortunately, she never got the chance to find out.

She completely forgot their meeting, their glances, their encounters, and got caught up in the real world and the life that had been laid out before her.

Her job always came first before anything at this point in her life, and so she made it a priority to get her workforce mended as quickly as possible. The scene of the fire wandered to the back of her mind, the coffee date never happened, and life went on.

And days, weeks, years later, when she was old and frail and sicker than ever, she vaguely wondered what would have happened if she had taken up that firefighter's offer to have coffee.

* * *

**_we were the lost, now we are the found_**

* * *

He first visited the zoo when Marco was feeling some sort of outdoor vibe that mostly irritated him out of all the raging emotions that whirled inside—as in, _why the hell does he feel the need to bring him a long?_

He had no intentions of ever visiting a zoo—it really didn't appeal to him, and the heat was unbearable at this time of the year—

But then he saw a zookeeper girl petting a tiger with docile precision, sharp eyes matching one another.

And everything changed in his miniscule little brain.

"Uh-" He tripped on the sidewalk as he approached her, but caught himself quickly, "Um, do you work here but any chance?"

The zookeeper looked up at him with the oddest expression to man, probably contemplating over how stupid his question was.

She was inside a cage… with a dangerous creature… and wearing the zoo uniform…

"No, of course I don't work here." Straight, nonchalant, and blank.

The man gulped inwardly.

"Shit, sorry," he rubbed the back of his head with frustration, "I just… you're petting a tiger."

She kept her eyes trained on him as she stroked the animal's fur. "I am."

"It's kinda neat."

"… Yeah."

They held each other's gaze for a little over a second, a hint of confusion mixed with curiosity dashing across her sharp features.

Marco was behind him just as he was about to utter another word. "Jean, how the hell did you get here? I swear, you were at the other exhibit—"

His eyes landed on the woman sitting just next to them, separated by the glass.

"Oh."

"Oh what?" Jean's eyebrow twitched slightly.

Marco smirked and winked at him when the zookeeper looked away for a split second. "Oh nothing."

The dumbstruck man gave his friend a look that said _say anything else and I might just hurt you_. The friend responded with his hands held up in defense.

However, the zookeeper seemed to pay no attention to both men, instead focusing on the tiger beside her. But at some moments, she would glance at the bronze-haired boy when she thought no one was looking.

He was staring back, of course.

As Marco chattered on about the common facts of tigers, Jean noticed that the woman was trying real hard to sneak a peek at him—and utterly failing, because he was staring back anyway.

But soon enough, the zookeeper was called away into the back of the exhibit by a midget who frowned a little too much, leaving the two with a simplistic goodbye nod. The man watched her leave with nothing more than a dumbfounded expression.

"You think she's cute."

"Hell yeah I do. So what."

"Shut up, Jean. You look like you've just shit your pants."

He gave Marco a glare that might have resembled an emerald-eyed boy, but he was too annoyed to care.

Two days later, he visited the zoo again, and refused to look at the guy that took his ticket at the entrance, all with an amused look.

"You're back here again?" The blond-haired man stared at him with a brow raised. "What's there to see here that you have to come back twice?"

The man took an interest in his shoes, focusing on them and the concrete. "Not sure yet," he mused, "we'll just have to see."

The blondie watched him for another moment, before giving him a cheesy smile, ushering him inside.

He made his way straight for the tiger exhibit, clammy hands and reddened cheeks fighting his complex—although he could blame it on the weather.

But it was not the weather. At all.

"You're back again." She was petting the same animal, orange and black adorning her companion, while pale green covered her.

He repeated his gestures again unknowingly—a rub of the head, an unconscious smirk—"I guess I am. Guess the tigers are just really interesting."

"Yeah," she let a smile slip through the cracks, "The tigers."

He chuckled at the sight of her lips and wondered if he was just really stupid. "Um, mind if I ask what your name is?" he stopped suddenly, then backtracked quickly. "You know, just in case I get in trouble or something and I have to call for help. Or like, the tiger tries to maul the glass to get to me or—"

"Mikasa," she coolly said her name and watched his eyes widen slightly, "My name is Mikasa."

The man gazed at her as if he had seen a star explode. Maybe that was how the look of wonder really looked like. Maybe that was what was on her face as well.

"Ah," A smile. "I'm Jean."

She left at nearly the same time she left a few days before, but he came back at the same time he came.

And the cycle repeated.

It was almost as if she expected him to come, and it was almost as if it had become a part of their daily routine. For some reason, he felt the need to drive all the way to the zoo to see a zookeeper take care of a tiger. No big deal.

"Where are you heading to now?" Marco asked one morning when he was already halfway out the door. "Do you have a girlfriend or is there another reason you always keep leaving?"

He immediately blushed at his words. "You—I—no! What?" Marco's grin only grew wider as his stuttering left him completely vulnerable. "No—ugh—what the hell! This is all your fault, Marco!" Without another word, the man promptly slammed the door and proceeded to trudge down the hallway with annoyance.

He came back three, or maybe five times, and she waited the exact same amount. And everybody at the zoo started to notice the weird occurences between them.

"Back again, Jean Kirschtein," The blondie reads his ticket once again with a raised brow. "You know, if you love this place so much, you should just pay for a season pass or something." He suddenly furrows his brows, before glancing at the bald man beside him. "Hey, Connie, do we have season passes here?"

Instantaneously, the man, Connie, glares at him. "Armin, we're not at an amusement park."

"I know, I was just joking around."

"Well, your joke wasn't very funny. Sasha is better at this than you."

"Why is it always Sasha?"

"Because at least she can pull off a better—"

The amber-eyed man lets out a deep sigh, tapping his foot annoyingly. "Can I just go in, please?"

Connie leans back, a smirk beginning to form at the corner of his mouth. He immediately lets the man inside, before looking at Armin with an amused expression.

"This is _definitely_ Mikasa's doing."

And as the approaches the same exhibit just like always, she's sitting there against the glass. As always.

"How do you get a tiger to let it be petted like that?" He asks just as he leans against the wall that separates them.

The zookeeper shrugs. "I guess cats just like me."

"Hm," he smiles nonchalantly, "I have a cat. It might like you."

"Might?" she asks.

"Yeah, she's kind of a nasty one."

"Ah," she lets out a chuckle, "Maybe we'll just have to test that theory."

"Sure… Why not?" He laughs, but then deliberately stops. "We could go… right now or something."

They both freeze as their words start to sink in. _Wait… what does that mean?..._

She turns her eyes to the tiger next to her, seemingly refusing to look at him.

_Did I just ask her out?... Yeah I just did._

"Okay… Yeah." He gulps, but pushes forward. "You can come… see… my cat."

_What the hell, Jean?_

The zookeeper suddenly sits up, looking back at him. Their eyes meet and his heart pounds as a sudden realization hits him.

_Holy shit, she's still beautiful._

"Wait right there." She stands up slowly, in order to appease the tiger and keep it from becoming startled. "I'll be right back."

The woman quickly leaves him, walking rapidly to the back of the exhibit. For the first time, he listens to her and plants his feet there, standing right where he was. His eyes lock with the animal before him, and they stay there—as if he's gazing at someone else.

He waits a few minutes, thoughts tumbling between the proximity of the cat before him and the maroon scarf that dons a certain zookeeper—how is she able to get away with that?—

"Okay, I'm back."

Jean jumps and swivels around, startled at her location.

She's actually outside of the cage. For the first time, there's nothing separating them.

"What?" she stares at his surprised expression, and he notices how much taller he is than her. But her features definitely make up for it. "You're looking at me as if I'm the tiger in there."

_Because you are_. "Sorry," he blinks, "I've just never seen you… well, here."

She tilts her head. "You have." She takes a step towards him. "There was just always a wall between us."

The man turns away from her slightly, but brings his eyes to hers nonetheless. "Yeah, well not anymore."

_She's still beautiful._

_Still? Why still? What does that mean?_

"So are we going to see your cat or what?" she crosses her arms, scarf falling just above her mouth.

He blinks, pointing at the exhibit and the tiger. "I thought you had work…?"

The zookeeper shakes her head. "Not today."

He is utterly befuddled. "Then why…."

"I just like seeing the tigers in my free time," she sighs, looking at the tiger near them, "And other things."

A vibrant smile spreads across his face. "Other things?"

She glares, but a hint of amusement can be found in her eyes.

"Jean, let's just get out of here."

He hears her say his name for the first time in a long time, and it feels like all the worlds he's heard of have finally come together.

"Where to? My place? Yours? A restaurant? Another zoo?" He counts out all the possibilities. "We could even catch a movie—er, I mean, watch a movie. Or. Uh…"

She rolls her eyes, but a bright smile still grazes her cheeks. "Wherever you want."

Her name is Mikasa, and her maroon scarf and her warm heart walks away from his ghost fingers and his calloused hands just as the tiger growls at him.

But he follows her, through and through. "Okay. Let's go."

The tiger watches as he speeds up to her, long strides meeting her calm footsteps.

"Let's go anywhere," he repeats again, walking faster and catching up to her, undeniably staying by her side. "You lead the way."

Familiar words and phrases link together somewhere in the distant universes that expand across their existences.

An old man and an oriental, an injured male and a fierce medic, a reckless leader and a headstrong soldier, a prisoner and a trapped savior, a firefighter and a woman in flames, and a captivated boy and an extraordinary girl.

_"Take me home, Jean."_

_"Okay. You lead the way."_

And she does.


End file.
